


From the Intercom

by twelvetrop



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Amy is a teacher, F/M, Jake is still a cop, Neighbours, also i love any excuse to write them, it was 3 am when this idea came in my head so if turns out bad thats why, sorry i still dont know how to do tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-09
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-06-25 14:16:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 20,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19747411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twelvetrop/pseuds/twelvetrop
Summary: Jake and Amy call each other every single day.Sometimes she calls him, sometimes he calls her. It's a crazy world out there, and they often find solace in each other.





	1. Singularity

**Author's Note:**

> This first chapter is a prologue so bear with me

**Singularity - The theorized shape of the Universe before the Big Bang.**

Amy Santiago stepped into her home, phone balanced between her ear and shoulder.

“Okay, but your arrest wasn’t that impressive.” She kicked the door shut and locked it, putting the keys in a table near the entrance. “I’ve dealt with students rowdier than that.”

Jake Peralta scoffed on the other end of the line. “Of course. I’m sure you had to tackle someone to the ground.”

After returning the phone to her hand, she heard some faint gunshot sound in the background of the call, and found herself smiling.

“You’d be surprised, actually.” She said, nonchalantly. “Also, start watching movies other than _Die Hard_.”

The sounds of the action movie disappeared. “First of all, it’s not _Die Hard,_ it’s _Point Break_. Second of all,” She could hear him shuffle on where he was. “You’ve got to tell me the story of when you tackled a student to the ground.”

She sighed and looked at her phone screen, attempting to both see how long she had been talking to Jake, and to give her arm a rest. She swore she could feel it going numb.

“Maybe another day, Jake. We’ve been speaking for two and a half hours and my arm is going to fall out of my shoulder.”

“Here’s a crazy idea, genius: put your phone on speaker.”

“You’re so brilliant, Peralta.” She said. “Teach me your ways.”

But she did obey him, going to her kitchen, setting the phone on the counter and tapping the volume icon.

“Am I on speaker now?” She heard him eat something (probably a chip of some sort, she really couldn’t bother learning his eating habits).

“Yeah.” She replied.

“Good. So, let’s return to my story and after that, you’re telling me about that time you tackled a student.”

Amy rolled her eyes.

“I know you’re already rolling your eyes but hear me out! It gets even better.”

“How can it get even better than you tackling someone into a trash can?" She opened her fridge. "By the way, Pizza or Thai?”

“Trust me, I’m good. Also, Pizza. It’s too late for Thai.”

“It’s eight PM.”

“Exactly.”

The conversation droned on for the rest of the night, and Amy did eventually tell him why she tackled a student (it was a fire drill that she took too seriously, Jake laughed at her).


	2. Big Bang Theory

**Big Bang Theory - The physical theory that shaped the Universe as we know it.**

Sometimes Amy forgot how she met Jake. It often slipped her mind, since talking to him had become such a routine that it felt like she was doing it since forever.

But when she stared blankly at a test with no hope of marking it, or when she looked at a shelf of a nearby book store for a few seconds too long, her mind wandered to the memories she had in her brain, that universe of emotions that she so often tried to disguise.

When she had the courage, she asked Jake about their first encounter, and they’d reminisce from there.

She didn’t have that courage often, though. Not that she didn’t like remembering their ‘early years’, because she really did. But with that came opening another mix of emotions, the galaxies of her feelings swirling around above her, colliding into each other, drifting apart, gravity working its slow but inevitable conclusion on every single one of them.

So she closed that universe and let herself keep on pretending, her brain giving little reminders that the past was the past, and nothing could change that.

* * *

When Jake and Amy first met, they were neighbours.

Amy was a recent college graduate that was given a position teaching, which she gladly took. Jake was fresh out of the academy, given a job at the 99th precinct, often just called the ‘Nine-Nine’ by his colleagues.

Because of the weird formatting of the apartments, their homes only shared one wall. This wall was both on the back of their living rooms, relegated to some waist-height tables where Amy kept her keys and Jake kept his DVD’s.

It was pure chance that they both left their apartments at the same time, Jake in uniform and Amy in a suit.

“Hey! I’ve never seen you around, did you just move here?” Amy asked him.

“Yeah.” Jake replied gloomily.

Amy looked at him curiously.

“Sorry it’s just… too early for me.” He yawned and stretched, and she could tell he was not a morning person. “Tell you what, after you get back home, knock on my door. If I’m not there, wait a couple hours and knock again. Let’s have some dinner or something.”

“Dinner?”

“Yeah. Food. You’re probably going to be hungry, right?” He looked at the watch on his wrist, and his eyes widened. “Shit! I’m going to be late. See you later!” He sprinted off towards the stairs at the end of the hall, leaving a speechless Amy staring at the place he used to be in.

Shrugging the whole thing off, she walked to her parked car outside and headed to her first day of work as a teacher.

* * *

Amy got home a dishevelled mess. Her day of work had gone perfect, obviously, but trouble started as soon as she left the campus.

First, her car broke down. She lifted the hood to try and find the issue, (she had a binder on car emergencies) but found herself unable to see anything through all the smoke her engine was emitting, which was probably a bad sign. So, she called a tow truck and her car was whisked away.

This meant she had to endure the stress of riding in public transportation.

She didn’t hate the New York bus service, but she didn’t exactly like it, either. It was tight, kind of uncomfortable, her bus smelled weird, but it dropped her off right in front of her building in less than ten minutes, so she couldn’t really complain all that much.

However, as soon as she got out of the bus, a lovely surprise was waiting on her by the exit. A lovely, smelly surprise.

“Great.” She mumbled to herself. “Love it when people can’t take care of their dogs.”

Realising she wore socks, she thanked whatever bigger entity there was then took off her shoes (a pair of black and simple high heels which she never wore again) and walked to the entrance of her apartment complex.

But luck really wasn’t on her side, when a car sped by the side of the road, near a hole filled with rain water from the day before. So, now she was dripping wet, walking with her socks on in the middle of street and without a car.

“ _Great._ ” She repeated.

She ignored people’s stares at her sorry state and walked (almost ran, really) to the door that separated her public life from her private life.

The first thing she did when she got home was throw her shoes in the trash can (they were uncomfortable, anyway) and sat on her couch.

She turned on her TV, only to see that, somehow, she had left FOX News on.

“Oh, fuck this republican bullshit.” She quickly scrolled through channels until she found some background noise to clear her head. A familiar tune of a random sitcom played, and she lied down, stretching herself through the entire length of the couch.

She yawned and had a vague sense that she was forgetting something. But a laugh track came from the screen in front of her, and she ignored the feeling.

* * *

A few hours passed, and someone knocked on her front door, causing the feeling she had supressed to come right back.

“Coming!” She yelled. Who knows, it could be her mom making a surprise visit to make sure everything was ‘in check’ and that she could ‘take care of thing for her if necessary’. She loved her mom, truly, but she was too much sometimes.

She checked her peephole, only to find an unfamiliar face, yet someone she recognized. Someone from the morning of that exact day.

She opened the wooden door and stared at him.

“Hey…?” He said, hesitantly.

“Yeah, I know, I look like shit.” Amy replied.

After studying him for a few seconds, though, she could tell he had been through quite a lot on his day as well. Scratches covered one cheek, there were dark circles under his eyes, and he had the general disposition of a dead person trying to be cheerful. His uniform, immaculate when she first saw him, was marked in odd places and she couldn’t help but notice the large dark stain that was on his right elbow. The place where a badge and name had been left nothing but a dark mark on the blue vest.

“Yeah, I know I look like shit too. Rough day.” He said, as an answer to Amy’s eyes surveying him.

She blinked a couple of times and apologized.

“Do you want to maybe postpone the ‘meet your neighbour’ dinner?” She said, after a time of awkward silence between them.

“Are you kidding me?” He smirked. “We both had shit days and you want to _not_ talk about it?”

She sighed and relented. “Fine. But I don’t have anything to eat right now. I moved in like, last week and I’m out of supplies.” She slapped her forehead. “I was supposed to buy groceries after work, but I forgot.”

“Who eats healthy when a shit day has passed? We’re treating ourselves today!”

This got a chuckle from her, and his smirk widened into a smile.

He was still on the fringe between her door and the rest of her home, so she stepped back, inviting him in.

“What are you, a vampire? Come on in!”

“If I was a vampire, inviting me in is a dumb decision.” But he walked into her apartment.

“Yeah, well, I wouldn’t mind being a creature of the night right now.”

She closed the door behind him, and sat on the couch, patting the space next to her for him to sit. She didn’t know why, but she felt like he could trust him. She had her phone in her pocket, though. Just in case.

He plopped down next to her and stared at the TV with her.

“Any ideas on what to eat?” He said, after a random laugh track passed.

“God, I don’t know. Something fat and bad for my liver, probably.” She didn’t take her eyes from the TV.

“Well, I’m going to order a pizza.” He took out his phone from his unkempt uniform.

“That’s perfect.”

After arguing over what toppings to put on their pizza, they decided to order two separate medium-sized pizzas for each other, as to not fight and actually eat in the next hour or so.

Jake called a pizza place which he guaranteed was great (it turned out to be Domino’s) and asked for her name so he could put in the address.

“Oh, it’s Amy. Amy Santiago.”

He relayed the message on the phone and, after hanging up, he replied to the unanswered question. “Well, Amy. I’m Jake. Jake Peralta.”

* * *

After the pizza arrived, they moved to the kitchen and talked about their incredibly shitty days. Amy told him about her day, and, in return, he told her about his. She found out why his cheek was scratched (he was trying to rescue a stray cat), about the stain on his right elbow (grease from a car) and why his uniform was all banged up (his colleagues thought it’d be fun to ruffle him up on his first day).

“Wait, it’s your first day too?” Amy asked, stopping mid-bite on a slice of her pizza.

“Yeah! I’m fresh out of the academy and was assigned in Brooklyn.”

“Is that… good?” Amy asked. She truly didn’t know.

“I think it is. I grew up in this city my whole life and I love Brooklyn so… It’s a win-win situation for me.” Jake took a gigantic bite out of a slice, and Amy was nearly disgusted. “What do you do?”

“A teaching job at my university. I’m giving a class about introduction to Art History since it’s kind of what I majored in.”

“Kind of?” He looked at her quizzically, taking a sip from his bottle of orange soda.

“Well, it _is_ what I majored in.”

They fell quiet for a while, only the sound of the television from the room over and the buzzing of the lights above them filling the silence.

“Man, you must be really proud of yourself.” He said.

She took a sip from her drink. “Aren’t you?”

The question hung in the air for a while.

“Well, I don’t know. This isn’t what I imagined what being a cop was, you know? I always pictured this John McClane type scenario where everyday is an exciting adventure fighting bad guys. All I got, though, was… cats. And filing parking tickets.”

She pondered on her next words. “Hey, it’s only the first day. Besides, there’s adventure everywhere around you. Maybe it’s not action movie level of excitement, but life is a big enough rollercoaster as it is.”

“Maybe I’ll catch a mob boss accidentally.” He looked dreamily at the tiled wall, and Amy realised Jake had heard nothing of what she said.

Instead of being annoyed at this, however, she smiled. “Maybe.”

* * *

They said their goodbyes at around ten in the evening, when they were both too tired to even talk. After walking him to his apartment door, Amy couldn’t even draw the strength to clean up the cardboard boxes they ate their meals in. Instead, she turned off the TV and went straight to bed falling asleep quickly (probably faster than she had ever fallen asleep).

She had wild dreams, her caged universe finally being able to throw all its creative force at her without limitations. The next morning, she had a vague feeling of something happening during the night, but it soon slipped right back into her unconscious.

 _It’s a new day._ She thought. _Let’s make it even better than ever before._

Then, she groaned.

_I have to catch the fucking bus._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love to hear your thoughts on my writing so go ahead and yell at me!


	3. Nucleosynthesis

**Nucleosynthesis - The first atom that was created after the Big Bang.**

Jake flipped his phone upside down and tapped it on the table, repeating the motion again and again, waiting for his shift to end. The day had been pretty much uneventful (read: boring) so he was just avoiding the paperwork he was supposed to do. He convinced himself he’d do it in the haze of the morning after, where he wasn’t quite lucid and thus, couldn’t really be held accountable for any mistakes in it. It was the perfect excuse.

It’s not like his sergeant was pressuring the squad, anyway.

After his thoughts drifted back into his head, he blinked a few times and stared at the watch on his wrist.

6:30 PM, it read. It was finally time to leave the precinct.

“See you tomorrow, guys!” Jake said to the floor and jettisoned off his chair.

A mumbled group of “Bye, Peralta” was heard from the rest of the officers, and Jake made a mental to check to try and liven up the squad the day after. Maybe with some fun games. Looking at the janitor cleaning up the floor, he thought maybe sliding across the hall might be a good idea. A bit uncomfortable in uniform, though.

His mind wandered again and, as he drove home, with the sounds of a random radio station distracting him from the loud New York traffic, he found himself thinking about the previous night and smiling, not really knowing why.

* * *

After managing to find a place to park his car, he got into his apartment and locked the door behind him, tossing the keys into the first random table he found. Sighing, he undressed from the uniform and took a second shower (he knew it was bad for the environment, but he really needed it). After putting on more comfortable clothes, he turned the TV on and half payed attention to an episode of Jeopardy.

It was a pleasant September evening, not too hot, but not too cold either. Jake sometimes wondered why he didn’t just take a walk on days like these, but the answer came to him soon enough: he was often too tired to even leave his couch.

Looking out the window, he could see the sun was nearly setting, making the sky turn purple and pink. He focused on the shades that dragged across the sky, the clouds a stark contrast from it, only their borders dyed with the atmosphere’s ever-changing tones.

He stared back at the television when a loud ringing sound echoed from it, and his thoughts stopped meandering on the artistic and started focusing on the realistic. As realistic as his mind could dwell on, anyway.

What caught him even more off guard was when a knock came from his door. Not bothering to get up from the couch, he yelled:

“Who is it?”

To which he got a response from a familiar voice.

“It’s Amy! Your neighbour?”

“Oh shit.” He said quietly.

He got up as fast as he could, passing his hands through his clothes and hair (even though, for once in his life, they were immaculate).

Unlocking the door, he opened it with a smile and said:

“Hey.”

“Hey.” She replied and stood in the doorway for a while before continuing. “Uhm, since you kept me company yesterday for dinner, and kind of payed for the whole thing, I thought I’d return the favour?” She showed what was in her hands, and he could see a couple of frozen meals and a bottle of soda.

“Well then, who am I to say no to free food? Come on in!” He graciously moved his arm and bowed slightly, to which Amy simply stepped forward in slight embarrassment.

She was wearing a pantsuit, with her hair tied up in a pony tail. Hidden among her hair, was a pair of discreet black glasses, which Jake noted had very thin temples.

He suddenly felt very underdressed.

“Glad to know you can wear something besides a police outfit.” Amy said, apparently looking at him with the same attention he was looking at her.

He closed the door behind her, tossing the keys in a random table again. “You’ve known me for one day, Santiago.”

“Santiago?”

“You know, your last name? If you don’t like it, I can stop right away.” He scratched the back of his neck, nervously.

She shook her head. “No, no, it’s fine! I don’t mind it… Peralta.”

The slight pause made him chuckle. “Did you forget my surname already? From the amount of binders in your house, I thought you’d be at least a bit more organised.”

Amy blushed. “I like making binders all right? Especially when there’s these ones on sale, I literally melt.”

“Well, you better get those packs on the freezer, otherwise you’re not the only thing melting here.”

Jake did a double take in his brain. Was that _flirty?_ He didn’t mean to make it sound flirty. Okay, maybe he wanted to be a little bit flirty. She was very attractive, and he didn’t exactly mind how her hazel eyes studied him when he said something funny.

But she rolled her eyes at him, and Jake thought he was overthinking things again.

“All right, do you have an oven? I’ll get these done straight away.”

“Why wouldn’t I have an oven?”

“I don’t know. Some people don’t.” She was serious, and Jake was slightly taken aback.

“Okay, I’m a mess but I’m not _that_ big of a mess.”

He found the conversation a bit absurd.

“Let’s just eat, yeah? I’m starving.” He changed the subject as gracefully as he could, which is to say not gracefully at all.

Amy nodded at his question, though, and they both headed out towards the kitchen.

He sat on one of the counters while Amy put her glasses on, read the instructions and followed them, putting both packs of lasagne inside the oven, using a glove as to not burn her hand.

“You know that the oven’s not even hot, right?”

“It’s a precaution, Jake.”

He smiled at that, even if it didn’t make any sense to smile.

After everything was set up, she asked him if she could sit on the counter opposite to him. He said yes, and she propped herself up, putting her glasses on top of her head again.

She sighed and undid her bun, letting her hair fall on her shoulders.

“What have you been up to today?” Jake asked, his legs waving back and forth, sometimes hitting the wooden drawers below him.

She followed his motion unintentionally. “Exhausting. Felt like no one was paying attention to what I was saying and that the kids didn’t care about the class at all.”

He frowned. “That sucks.”

“Yeah, I know. Plus, my car is still in the shop and I had to take the bus again which isn’t exactly pleasant.”

“Ah yes, the dangers of public transportation.”

“Have you caught anyone riding illegally on the bus yet?”

He shook his head. “No bus duty as of yet.”

“When you get there, you’ll have some stories to tell.”

“Buses are really wild, aren’t they?” He stretched his arms and nearly fell off his spot. “You spot the weirdest things in them.”

Amy chuckled when he nearly fell. “I swear someone was rolling up a joint in the backseat.”

“Isn’t weed legal now, though?”

“You’re the cop here, bud.”

Jake laughed, and they fell into an easy rhythm after that, the humming of the oven as a constant reminder that they shouldn’t get too drawn in conversation. At least, not yet.

* * *

“You have _seven_ brothers?” Jake gasped.

Amy picked at parts of her food and nodded. “Seven brothers.”

“How did that go?” A beat. “Was it… nice? I’m an only child, so I don’t really know.”

“It… was. Family is a weird thing.” She had her head leaned against one of her hands. “I know I can count on them for most things, but that didn’t stop them from annoying me to death. Plus, there’s David, perfect child who you can never live up to.”

Jake noted the slight tone of anger in her voice. “Well, if we’re talking about dysfunctional, my dad left when I was like, eleven or so.”

Immediate empathy washed over Amy’s face. “Jake, I’m so sorry.”

“No, it’s fine. He was an asshole anyway.”

A bit of awkward silence filled the room.

“But you know, since we’re sharing and all, want to hear about that time where I nearly drank paint on accident?” Jake asked.

Amy almost spat her drink out. “You did _what?_ ”

“It was an accident, Santiago.”

“How do you nearly drink paint on accident?”

* * *

Jake was really enjoying this night. Considering he enjoyed the previous night as well, it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that this one was as pleasant, but it did.

Amy was someone new, who shared such a different view point on life than him that it should be reasonable for them to be at each other’s throats constantly, but it all fell into a playful banter that he was starting to enjoy so much. If this was part of his new routine, he was absolutely fine with it.

After they finished eating, they moved into the living room, where Amy noted that he had a lot of DVD’s.

“All you have are basically action movies.” She said to him. “And, for some reason, you own five copies of _Die Hard_ ”

“First of all, the action genre is the best genre. Second of all, _Die Hard_ is the best movie ever made, action or not!”

She rolled her eyes. “ _Training Day_ is better.”

Jake moved his hand to his chest. “How dare you?”

“Don’t act so offended, you know it’s true.”

“I would never admit to such blasphemy.”

“What is this, church?” Amy pointed to the couch, and Jake nodded. They both sat down. “Also, you have to clean your place up. It’s driving me up the wall seeing your DVD’s spread so lazily around.”

“Thought you were a bit of a clean freak. Your house looks like an old lady’s place.” He flicked through some channels.

“I like to keep things _organized._ It’s different.” She turned to look at him. “Also, an old lady’s place? Come on, I have contemporary art on my wall, not a random crying child.”

Jake looked at her as well. “Ah, of course. The very important portrait of a crying child is always the most important part of an old person’s home. A centrepiece, you could say.”

She punched him lightly on the shoulder. “Shut up.”

They spent more time talking, completely giving up on the idea of paying attention to the TV.

Soon enough, midnight approached, and Amy excused herself, claiming she had to get up early tomorrow. Before she could fully leave, however, Jake asked her a simple question.

“Want to meet another time?”

She hesitated on the doorstep. Jake’s mind then truly went into wild places. Did he get the idea wrong? Was this just a one-time situation? Did she think he was creep? He should probably say something not creepy.

 _How do you say something not creepy when you’re trying to not be creepy?_ He thought.

“Sure.” She said. “Probably not tomorrow, though.”

He gave her a thumbs up. “I’m fine with that. We could have dinner like, once a week together?”

She smiled. “All right then.”

They stared at each other through the doorway.

“Good night, Jake.”

“Night, Amy.”

The door closed, and he couldn’t get the smile out of his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know these chapters are super short but making them go on longer just feels super artificial to me... sorry  
> i'll try to make them longer!  
> and tell me what you think!


	4. Baryogenesis

**Baryogenesis - A hypothetical physical process that caused the imbalance of matter and antimatter.**

“It’s not like _that_ , Kylie.” Amy said to the phone.

“You’ve been talking to a guy, who happens to be your neighbour, for nearly six months and you keep saying that he makes you smile and laugh? How am I supposed to believe it’s not like _that_?”

Amy loved Kylie, she really did. They’d been best friends since high school, and it was a bond that she was sure it was never going to break.

But right now, she wanted to punch her.

“Please stop.” She said.

Kylie laughed, but it wasn’t ill intended. “Never. It’s my job to annoy you.”

Amy was lying on her bed, staring at the ceiling. Some soft classical music played from her computer, which was on her nightstand. She had been staring at it for a couple of hours, trying to make a test, but couldn’t bring herself to write anything decent. The questions were either too hard or too easy, and she couldn’t strike a good middle term on it. She _could_ fill the test with anything that came to her mind, but it wasn’t fair to her students, and she knew it.

So, instead of possibly losing her sanity, she dialled Kylie’s phone number (which she had somehow memorised at this point) and started a conversation. She somehow forgot that she hadn’t mentioned Jake to her once, even though the women made a point of speaking every week.

“I still can’t believe you didn’t tell me about any of this the second after it happened. Is he hot? Give me his social media profiles.” Kylie shut off the TV on her end, and Amy gulped.

Things were about to get serious.

“This isn’t an interrogation, Kylie.”

“It is now. Answer the questions and send the links.”

Amy sighed. “Do we really have to do this? I’m supposed to be working on this big test that makes or breaks the subject for my students.”

“Yeah, you’re always working, and I know you’re going to turn out fine. So, time to spill every detail.”

Amy tried in vain to find any loophole as to not talk about it, but she couldn’t. Truthfully, she didn’t know why she was so nervous to talk about it. To talk about him.

She liked spending time with Jake. She liked talking with him, liked yelling at him about his room, liked the couple of times that they had crossed in the street (him in uniform, her in a pantsuit) and then decided to eat something together, or just walk around. She liked Jake, she really did.

Now, if she liked him the way Kylie was _implying_ she did, that was a whole other story.

Another sigh escaped her. If there was any time to figure things out, it’d be at that moment.

“I mean. Is he attractive? I- I think so.” A pause. “He has this goofy smile that makes me want to smile as well, and he just… he makes me laugh. He makes my day better, I think.”

“I asked for physical aspects, not a full-on declaration of love.”

“What!? You’re crazy. I’m not in love with him. He can’t clean his house for the life of him and-”

“You’ve been to his house?” Kylie interrupted her.

“We’re _neighbours,_ Kylie.” Another pause. “But yes, every week or so I go to his place for dinner.”

She heard a gasp. “Oh my God.”

“He comes by as well!”

“Oh my God!”

Amy hid her face in her hands. “I can’t handle you. How are we friends? I’m going to hang up and never talk to you again.”

“Girl, you’re head over heels in love with this guy.”

“I’m not in love with him!” Amy exclaimed, exasperated.

“Well you’re in _something_. And I don’t think it’s just friendship.”

Amy shifted around and let her feet dangle on the edge of her mattress. “Okay let’s assume that I have feelings for him – which I don’t.”

“Just you saying that is basically admitting you do like him, but okay.”

“I’m literally going to hang up. We either work in hypotheticals or not at all.”

She heard silence from the other end. “Fine. ‘Hypotheticals’ it is, then.”

“I can hear the air quotes from here, and I’m telling you to stop it right now.”

“Out of sight, out of mind?”

Amy rolled her eyes. Even with her best friend, she couldn’t catch a break. “Ugh. Hold on, I’m going to get some water.”

“Walk me to the kitchen, I don’t want to miss the epic Amy Santiago Chug.”

Amy nearly choked on air. “That was one time!”

“I should trademark that.”

“Oh my God.”

Amy walked to the kitchen, leaving her friend reminiscing on the bed. When she came back, fully refreshed, she picked up her phone, only to hear voices she didn’t recognize on the other end of the line.

“Kylie?”

After a while (which felt like ages), Kylie picked up the phone.

“Sorry, you were taking too long and I got bored.”

“So you started watching a show? I was five minutes, tops.”

“That’s four minutes too long.” The sound stopped. “But that’s besides the point. Spill.”

“I really can’t catch a break with you. But fine.” Amy took a deep breath.

And started talking about everything. She talked about the first two days they spent together, the deal that was struck between them. She talked about how they only got each other’s number a month after getting to know each other, and how after that they talked on a nearly daily basis. Jake usually sent her random photos of him in his small corner desk at the precinct, and she usually replied with the almost empty auditorium of a class that was about to start. She talked about how one time Jake got her something from her favourite Polish place, and that it had touched her so much that she gave in to his demands to eat “display temperature” (see: almost cold) pizza at a place called Sal’s (she didn’t like it, but it had made Jake happy to see her try, so she pretended it was good).

She walked through her memories and found herself gasping at how much she remembered.

“Are you sure you’re not into him?” Kylie asked, once she was done.

“I don’t know. I really don’t know.”

* * *

The next time Jake knocked on her door, Amy was slightly panicking. Sure, the date had been set (not like a date _date_ but, you know, a date. In a calendar) and she was expecting him soon, so it didn’t make any sense to panic over him being around her, since they’d done this so many times.

But she was panicking over the conversation she’d had over him with Kylie.

_“Hang around him and see how you feel. You know, that butterfly thing that all the books that you love to read talk about.” Kylie had said._

_“And what do I do if I feel like that?” Amy was nervous, more than she felt like she should be._

_“You tell him.”_

_“But what if he doesn’t like me back? I don’t want to lose this friendship, Kylie.”_

_“Then he’d be a fool of a man. But, from what you told me, I’m pretty sure he like you too.” She’d reassured her. “Also, I stalked him on his socials and he seems pretty nice.”_

_That got a laugh out of Amy._

When she opened her door and saw him standing there, with his same old goofy smile, Amy swore she’d almost melt on the spot.

“I thought today could be like a taco night!” He waved the tortilla bread that was in his hands. “Do you have things to put on them? Because I definitely do, so if you want me to pop back in my apartment…”

“No, no, it’s fine! I have them!” Amy said, a bit too loud.

Jake looked at her, suspiciously. “Have you had something to drink? Two drinks, in fact?”

She cleared her throat. “No. Sorry, it’s been a long day.”

_And a longer night lies ahead of me._ She thought.

“All right then.” He stepped inside her place. “If for one second you think that your crappy mood is going to ruin taco day, be prepared to be wrong.”

“All that’s left is for it to be Tuesday, I guess.” She closed the door behind him.

Quickly returning to their routine, Jake and Amy headed to the kitchen to make their meals. Jake always insisted on doing everything himself, to which Amy always scoffed and shoved him back, resulting in a heated discussion about whose culinary talents was better. An agreement was always arrived at, with the pair doing their meals individually and then tasting the others to see which one was better (they were usually of the same subpar quality – not bad, but not great either. It worked for them, though).

After dinner was made and they sat down at the table, across from one another, the usual banter followed.

“How was work today?” Jake asked, taking a large bite out of his taco.

“Had a test today!” She replied.

“You’re the only person I know who gets excited about tests, even more about making them and correcting them.” He licked his fingers. Amy would’ve been disgusted if she wasn’t so used to it at this point.

“It’s a fun way to challenge your brain! The way I see it, it’s a puzzle just waiting to be solved.”

“Why would you solve a puzzle when you can just google the solution”

Amy rolled her eyes. “What’s the point in reaching the solution with no merit?”

Jake hesitated, as if he was thinking. “Touché”

“I don’t know if that’s the term you should be using right now.”

“Well, I used it anyway.” He flashed a smile at her. “Deal with it.”

Amy took a last bite out of her food and stared at him for a while. He was wearing a grey NYPD shirt (they stopped trying to look good in front of each other at around the third month, opting to be as comfortable as possible) and she could already tell he was going to stain it. She had scolded him several times to at least try to wear a napkin over his shirt, which always got the same response from him (“I’m not a baby, am I?”).

It all felt so… home-like. So easy. So warm.

And at that point she couldn’t deny what she was feeling any more.

She got up from her chair suddenly, telling Jake that she was going to the bathroom (she hoped he didn’t hear how her voice nearly cracked).

Amy closed the bathroom door behind her and stared at the mirror.

“What am I doing?” She said to her reflection, hoping it would come to life and reply.

It didn’t, however, and the question was left echoing on the tiled bathroom wall, soon fading and being replaced by the sounds of her apartment and the streets outside.

She splashed water across her face and looked at herself in the reflective surface once more.

_“How am I supposed to tell him that I, hypothetically, like him?” Amy had asked._

_“ ‘I think I like you’ ” Kylie had replied._

_“Ha ha, Kylie. Hilarious.”_

_“I’m serious.”_

_“Oh my God.”_

A knock was heard on the bathroom door.

“Hey, Ames?”

_Ames._

“You’ve been in there for quite some time.”

_I have?_

“You okay in there?”

_No? I don’t know. I may have feelings for you, and I don’t how to tell you._

“Yeah, I’ll be right out!”

A pause.

“Well, I already put the dishes in the washer, so you can just go to the living room whenever.”

_You’re really not making this easier, man._

“Thanks, Jake!”

She washed her face off and slapped her cheeks slightly.

_Come on, Santiago. You’re no chump, mama didn’t raise no quitter._ She thought.

_Why are you thinking like a cliché?_ Her mind replied.

She ignored it and got out of the bathroom.

Back in the living room, she saw that Jake had a movie paused and was stretched on her couch, scrolling through something on his phone. Everything about it looked perfect, and she found herself smiling for the millionth time at the familiarity of it all. He raised his head and caught her glance, smiling just as warmly as ever.

“Ready to watch this?”

“What is ‘this’, exactly?”

He turned his head towards her, with an expectant look.

“Don’t you want to sit down first?” He used his feet to invite her to sit down.

“Only if we can snuggle.” She joked.

“I’ll take that challenge.” His eyes glowed mischievously.

And Amy found herself with Jake’s chin on her head, watching a random romantic comedy. It was the stuff of dreams (her dreams, maybe? She really didn’t remember any of hers, but it certainly felt like one) so she couldn’t believe she was living through it.

Halfway through, Jake fell asleep, and Amy realised that by the steadiness of his breath. She could fill his chest pull out and give back in again, and wondered if she was in too deep when she admitted to herself she liked feeling it. It was safe.

After the movie was over (and because the remote was conveniently at arms’ reach), she turned off the TV.

Amy pondered going to bed, but she was extremely comfortable lying there, on his chest.

She was adjusting herself when she accidentally elbowed him on his chest.

He instantly awoke with pain.

“Oh fuck! I’m sorry.”

He rubbed the area where she had struck him. “Jesus, that hurt! Remind me to never get into a fight with you.”

“Yeah, you’d probably lose.”

Jake wiggled his eyebrows. “Overconfident, are we?”

She suddenly realised how close she was to him. She could see every detail in his face: his warn brown eyes, the slight dimples he made when he was smiling, the curls on his head.

Amy didn’t know if it was the rush of everything, if her mind was running at a million miles per hour or how his smile looked, but she kissed him.

It lasted for only a second, but she pulled back quickly and covered her mouth.

“Oh my God.” She said.

Jake looked slightly bewildered.

“I’m so sorry, I’m just… I’m going to throw myself out of the nearest window.” Her face was red, and she knew it.

“Amy, I-”

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done that, I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Santiago, listen to me-”

Amy got up. “I’m just gonna run to my room and lock myself in it until I rot, is that reasonable? It seems reasonable.”

“Ames, please-” He got up as well.

She started walking to her room, turning her back towards him. She couldn’t see Jake right now. He probably hated her after doing something so rash and stupid. “It’s a good idea, right? It seems wise to-”

And then he turned her around and kissed her.

She pulled back after a while. “What are you doing?”

“What does it seem like I’m doing? I’m kissing the girl I like.”

She felt a rush on her face. “Oh.”

“I’m surprised it took you this long.”

“God, shut up.” And she pulled him back in and kissed him again.

They ended up falling asleep on the couch, wrapped on their own warm embraces.

* * *

_“What if you just kiss him out of the blue? That’s certainly one way to know if you like him.” Kylie had said._

_“Oh, shut up. That’s never going to happen.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey this chapter is slightly longer! congrats me  
> also i wrote this while basically just drinking water and listening to the final fantasy preludes so if it reads like a fever dream that's why  
> as usual, tell me what you think!


	5. Expansion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some light smutty thing in this chapter i guess so i turned up the content rating to mature  
> it's nothing explicit though, so it's cool  
> (kinda like the sex scenes in red, white & royal blue, emotionally driven and all that jazz)

**Expansion - The act of growing outwards. If the Big Bang theory is to be believed, this initial explosion is causing our Universe to expand, even up to this day.**

The next week was torture for Jake.

He couldn’t really believe that Amy had kissed him. Or that he had kissed Amy. And that they kissed again after that.

Unfortunately for him (and, he hoped, for her too) she was going to spend that exact week with her parents, because she ‘had promised a long time ago’ to do that.

So, he was stuck just texting her or calling her (if he was lucky and could understand anything through the speaker; the Santiago household really was chaotic).

He almost didn’t mind it, though. Almost.

“She hasn’t talked about the…” Jake struggled to find the words. “The _thing_ that happened between us. At all.”

He was at Shaw’s, a bar near the precinct, where most cops went to unwind. Jake liked to stand in a corner and make heart eyes at the detectives, much to the annoyance of his friend and current partner, Rosa Diaz.

“Maybe she just wants to talk about it in person. I don’t know her, I can’t tell you how she works, man.” Rosa took a swig off her beer. It was probably the third time that day that Jake had talked about Amy and, adding up to the whole week, Rosa was starting to lose her patience. Fast.

“But it’s been a week, Rosa. A _week._ ” He almost sounded desperate. Amy was supposed to arrive that day, but she still hadn’t said anything.

“Well, you guys keep talking regularly, right?” Rosa took another swig.

Jake nodded.

“Then I don’t see the problem. It seems like you’re overthinking this, Jake.” Rosa looked somewhere behind him. “Now, if you don’t mind, that guy over there is hot and I want to outrank him in darts.”

With that, Rosa grabbed her beer, left the stool next to Jake and walked off in the direction of the game. Jake sighed again and looked at the folded arms of his uniform.

Okay so _maybe_ he was thinking too much into this. Maybe Rosa was right, she just wanted to talk about it in person. Maybe she felt the same way for him as he did for her.

_Why do you think maybe? She kissed_ you _first!_ He thought.

_Yeah what if it was an accident?_ His mind replied.

_Are you that stupid or is this just the paranoia? Suck it up, Peralta. You have two options: either text her about it or wait until she gets home and talk to her about it then._

The realisation hit him like a truck: if she wasn’t talking to him about it, maybe it’s because she was waiting for an incentive on his part. She did take the initiative first, so it’d make sense to be him to do something next.

Gathering up his courage (and with the help of the alcohol in his system) he sent her a short text message:

_Are you home?_

After being jittery for the next minutes, staring at his phone and hoping for some reply (or the ‘delivered’ status on his message to become visible), he decided he needed a distraction, otherwise he’d drive himself insane. After deciding that scrolling through his phone wasn’t enough, he put it in the back pocket of his pants and looked around at the officers in the bar. He saw that Rosa was somehow alone again, so he approached her, cautiously.

“What happened to the hot guy?”

“Eh, he wasn’t that interested in playing darts. If his head isn’t in the game…” She had a dart on her hand, one eye closed and focusing on the target. “He’s not going to able to focus on much else.” Rosa threw the dart, and it landed squarely on the side.

“Ah! Almost on target, Diaz!” Jake mocked her.

“Use that tone again and this dart is going somewhere not as nice, Peralta.” Rosa threatened.

He put his hands in the air, as if he was surrendering (he felt like he was, because she was honest to God terrifying) “All right, all right. I just wanted to play some darts, man.”

She looked at him up and down and handed him a few darts that were on her other hand. “Winner buys the other a beer?”

“Deal.” Jake took them.

Soon, the small environment of the pub became a heated competition between the two officers, and it was intense for either of them. Rosa was a sharpshooter but could barely hit the centre of the board that day, so even though she hit most darts, she never got much points. Jake, on the other hand, sometimes missed the board altogether but, when he hit it, he got dead centre most of the time.

In the end, Rosa was ahead of Jake, but by a thin margin. A margin that he could close if he hit the middle of the board.

Taking a deep breath, he closed one of his eyes and focused. He completely shut down the sounds of the loud conversations happening and thought that dart was him, and he was the dart. All he had to do was shoot himself (aka the dart) to the centre. That was it.

He slung his arm and saw the projectile fly, and he was in the air flying straight ahead, there was no resistance whatsoever around him, he was floating in space and-

“God damn it, Peralta!” Rosa yelled, then punched him the shoulder.

He didn’t even register the pain. “Yes! I’m the king of the world! And!” He pointed at her. “You owe me a beer!”

She rolled her eyes and was about to head for the bar when he stopped her.

“But not right now. Leave it for another day, all right?”

She raised her eyebrows.

“I’m going home for now. It’s kind of late and we have work tomorrow…”

“As if you bother on arriving on time like… ever. Just say that you want to see Amy and go.”

Jake flinched. “That’s a bit harsh but… I guess you’re right.”

She nudged her head towards the exit. “Go home.”

He winked at her. “Will do.”

Once he got in his car, he nearly forgot to check his phone, since he was so caught up in the game with Rosa. He unlocked it only to find one notification from her.

_Yeah, I am! Finally._

* * *

The drive home was peaceful. He didn’t know if it was because Amy was home, and he could finally see her or if he won the game against Rosa (it was probably the former, but he suspected that the latter also put him in a good mood).

He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel to the sound of a song, trying to catch its rhythm from the beat in the background. He didn’t really recognize it, but he didn’t care. It felt happy and that was all he needed.

The street lights sped by as he found the New York streets surprisingly empty, making the trip to his building a short one. He found himself driving slower than he could, however, just to appreciate the drive.

After managing to park his car at a decent distance from his house, he unlocked the front door of the complex and called the elevator. It hummed as it descended and, when it opened, he found Amy standing there. She was wearing a baggy shirt with some sweatpants, carrying three garbage bags in her hands.

“Oh, hi!” She said.

He wanted to kiss her right then and there.

“Need any help?” He pointed to the bags. “You seem to be struggling.”

“I am not struggling!” She looked nearly offended, but Jake could tell she was half-joking.

“All right, ma’am.” He said, with a smile.

Amy immediately backed down. “If you want to help, well… I wouldn’t mind.”

“Is my smile just enough to melt you, Santiago?” But he took two of her bags.

“You wish, Peralta.”

The elevator went down again, and Jake realised just how close he was to her. But kissing her with garbage around didn’t seem like the most romantic thing ever, so he made small talk.

“So… how was the week?”

“Hell.” She sighed, adjusting her glasses with her free hand. “But sort of nice, too.”

“Did you see…” He tried recalling one of her brother’s names. “David?”

“David? Thankfully, no.” She laughed. “Thanks for trying to remember, though.”

“Hey, it’s seven people right? I had to at least remember one.” He sighed. “Didn’t have to be the one you hated.”

She elbowed him. “I don’t hate him! He just…”

“Makes you rant for long periods of time about how he’s the family favourite? Yeah, we’ve been there. Several times.”

She looked at him, and he looked at her. They stared at each other for what felt like hours, until a familiar ‘ding’ from the elevator brought them to reality.

They threw the trash into the surprisingly modern system of underground trash chutes and headed to the elevator again. Amy slapped her hands together as if she was cleaning them, and Jake copied the gesture unconsciously.

And then they were locked inside the tight grey box again.

Jake asked permission to take her glasses off, and she nodded. He was shocked at the thickness of the lenses. “How come have I never noticed that your glasses are this thick?”

“Because you’re not supposed to notice!” She took the glasses away from him and cleaned them with her shirt. “And I can’t really see without them. Or my contacts.”

“Yeah, I know.”

The conversation died down again and he grabbed his wrists nervously. Jake didn’t know what else to talk about. He took a deep breath and asked the question that was making the air between them so tense.

“So, about last week…”

“Oh my God.” Amy covered her face.

His heart dropped. “Oh. Uhm, okay.”

Amy immediately regained her composure. “It wasn’t a bad ‘oh my God’. It was a good one! I… I like you, Jake. I do.”

“Why do I feel like there’s a ‘but’ coming?” His heart was probably on his feet right now.

“There’s no ‘but’’s!” She groaned. “Why is this elevator taking so long!”

Jake kept quiet, hoping that what she said didn’t sound as bad as it, and the elevator dinged again to signal the arrival at their floor. He invited her to step out first, and she accepted the invitation, with him a safe distance behind.

The doors closed, and they were left in the dim lights of the hallway.

“I like you Amy. Like… a lot.” Jake started. “And if you don’t like me back that’s okay, but-”

“Oh, for the love of God.” She closed the distance between them and kissed him ferociously.

He was surprised by it but matched her tenacity suit. They went down the hall slowly, only breaking apart to breathe.

“Why are our apartments at the end of the hall?” Jake asked, in one of those breaths.

Amy laughed. “Jake, you idiot.”

She grabbed his hand and dragged him to her house (it was, in fact, the closest to the elevator).

As soon as the door closed behind them, the kissing intensified, and they were reaching for each other in ways they didn’t know they could. Amy clinged to Jake’s neck as if he was the branch that kept her from falling off a cliff, and Jake grabbed onto her hips with the same amount of fervour.

It didn’t take long for them to reach her bedroom, where all their clothes came off and they took things slowly (thankfully, Amy had condoms in her nightstand). Jake couldn’t believe how lucky he was, to like someone as (putting it bluntly) hot as Amy and have her like him back. He didn’t know what he did to deserve her, but he couldn’t really complain. She was basically the woman of his dreams.

The sex was slow and passionate, and they kept mumbling each other’s name during the act. It was as if something was being sealed by making love to each other, sharing every inch of their bodies with each other. They dove into that feeling, trying to make the best of the night, like they weren’t going to be able to see each other the morning after.

They finished, panting and gasping, sweat dripping over their bodies.

“If I knew that sex with you was going to be like this, I would’ve skipped the gym.” Jake panted.

Amy chuckled and messed with his hair.

“You’re so stupid.”

He looked at her and, amidst the darkness, could tell that her lips were forming a smile. He smiled back at her.

“I’m only stupid for you, Amy.”

“I don’t know if that’s a compliment or an insult.” Amy pulled the sheets up, covering herself.

“Definitely a compliment.” Jake followed her motion.

“Yeah, you’d think that, wouldn’t you?”

They stared at each other, taking in the details.

“Big spoon or little spoon?” Jake asked, out of the blue.

“What?” Amy was confused.

“I prefer to be the little spoon, so if you don’t mind.” He turned his back on her.

Amy caught on and hugged his back.

“I like you, Jake.” She said, before falling asleep.

Jake sighed. “I like you too, Ames.”

* * *

Jake was awoken by a loud beeping from the other side of the room. He felt a weight leave his back and, soon after, the sound stopped.

“Good morning.” Amy said.

Jake still had his eyes closed. “Let me sleep the whole morning.”

“Come on, Jake. It’s six thirty.”

“It’s _what?_ ” He opened his eyes and turned to look at her. “Why are you awake at this ungodly hour?”

She turned her head. “To be at work at eight?”

“You’re wild.” He yawned violently. “That’s it, I can’t be with a morning person. We’re breaking up.”

Amy got up and put on a robe. Jake missed her warmth.

“I need to shower Jake! Now come on.” She clapped her hands, and he sunk his head in the pillow. “Go to your apartment and get changed.”

“No.”

“You’re literally a child.” She puffed. “All right, I’m going to shower.”

He lifted his head from the pillow and looked at her mischievously. “Can I join?”

Amy laughed and threw his clothes at him. “Go home, dumbass.”

He groaned and started putting his clothes on. Jake hated that they both had work and had to go to them like adults, instead of calling in sick and spend all morning cuddling.

God, how soft was he becoming? Cuddling? This was unlike him.

But looking at the closed door of the bathroom, listening to the shower run, he found himself smiling again.

Maybe he wouldn’t mind going soft for her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as usual, tell me what you think! All feedback I get is appreciated :)


	6. Cosmic Background Radiation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if this chapter sounds a bit... disjointed, sorry. I wasn't feeling particularly inspired while writing this.

**Cosmic Background Radiation – The microwave radiation left by the Big Bang.**

Amy closed the door to her apartment and threw herself on the couch. It had been an exhausting day, and all she wanted was…

…Well, she wanted to be with Jake.

Two months had passed since they began dating, and she felt things were great. Unfortunately, he was MIA for a week on a stakeout, a simple message as her warning.

_I’m on a stakeout. Don’t know when I’ll be back… sorry. Still like you tho_

She looked at the message for the thousandth time and sighed.

* * *

On the first day without Jake, she played with her hair.

The year was nearly over, and the last week of classes was upon her students, which meant two things:

  1. Her students didn’t care about what she was lecturing.
  2. She somehow had to find a way to captivate them.



She hit a dead end on the second point on her (admittedly, incredibly short) list. She tried using Kahoot, since those quizzes always seemed to cheer up people, but all she got was fifty percent wrong answers. This led her to conclude that, no matter what she did, nothing could make the brains of her pupils work. And _that_ made her realise that she was a useless teacher, was going nowhere in life, etc. etc.

She would’ve started spiralling if she hadn’t looked at Jake’s message again. It did keep her negative thoughts at bay just scrolling back in their ridiculous conversations. When she was eating lunch, she found herself just looking through them, probably looking miserably happy.

_what do you mean you never ate cereal with orange juice?_

I’m not an animal, jake

_It’s so good tho. you gotta try it. I’ll show you when I get home_

pls don’t

jake???

“Is everything all right?” A man asked Amy.

“Uh, yeah. Just a lot on my mind.” She replied and cracked a smile.

“I get you man. End of the year is hell.” He sat down across from her in the teacher’s cafeteria. “Say, you’re new here, right?”

“Yup. First year.” She moved her fork in circles over the plate. “It’s been nice.”

“You like teaching?” He sounded genuine.

“I… I think I do, yeah. It’s been a hard year but lately things have been sailing smoothly.” She rubbed her eyes and put her back on the chair. This made her grimace, since the seat wasn’t exactly the most comfortable thing in the world.

“They really should upgrade these chairs, shouldn’t they?”

“God, you’re absolutely right.” Amy looked at the person in front of her. “Sorry, I don’t really know your name.”

“Oh, that’s fine. I don’t usually have lunch here…” He scratched his neck, then stretched his arm. “I’m Ted”

“Well Ted, I’m Amy.” She shook his hand. “How come have I never seen you around?”

“Well, I don’t know what department you’re from, but I work in the Literacy department.”

Amy resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Well, I’m from Art History. That’s my official teaching job, anyway.” She waved her arms in the air. “Art History for dummies. That’s basically the name of my course.”

Ted chuckled. “How’s your approval rate so far?”

“Dismal.” She said, nonchalantly.

Ted looked at her. “Uhm, well…”

“I’m kidding! I’m kidding.” She shook her hands in the air. “That was me trying to be funny.”

He laughed. “Well, I was about to run away from you.”

“I would completely understand. You know who Joseph Molder is?” Ted nodded. “Well I had, like, five subjects with him and what a nightmare. That man was _not_ made to teach.”

“Yes! Finally, someone who agrees with me.”

Amy was about to rant about _Mr. Molder_ , when her phone rang. She looked at it and saw that it was almost time for her class to start.

“Shit.” She started packing things away in a hurry. “Sorry, I have a class.”

“Hey, that’s fine. It feels great to finally bond with someone who hates Molder as much as me.” He flashed a smile at her.

“See you sometime, Ted!”

She was about to run to the auditorium when he said one last thing.

“Teddy, please. My friends call me Teddy.”

Amy waved goodbye and shot off to class.

* * *

On the second day with no news of Jake, she sighed.

Sitting at the cafeteria after her classes had ended, she was sitting on a table in the college cafeteria. It was a wide circular space, with big windows on her left and right side, to let light in. There were stairs behind her, a sharp incline that led to the first floor where most of the auditoriums were located. In front of her, there was a glass counter, displaying all the food available. A little to the right of that, lay a narrow corridor that led to some elevators and stairs to the parking garage below her.

She was sitting alone at a small, white, circular table, with a small rectangle shaped napkin dispenser (that were so thin she needed at least two as to not have leftover paper on her face) in the middle of it. Beside her, lay coffee and a muffin.

Amy was avoiding going home, and it definitely wasn’t because she didn’t like how Jake wasn’t around and kept her company. Yes, it wasn’t that.

“Alone again?” A familiar voice asked from behind her.

“Naturally.” She concluded.

Teddy sat in the chair across from her, and took a napkin from the dispenser, which immediately ripped in half. He frowned, and Amy laughed.

“Yeah, there’s a trick to this.” She showed him that he needed to push the napkins a bit back and _then_ take one.

“The more you know.” Teddy followed her procedures. “You seem to have experience in this.”

“Yeah, well, I studied here. You’re bound to learn all tips and tricks if you stick by me.”

“You studied here? I always thought you were a transfer.” He started to fold the thin sheet of paper.

“Why do I always get that?” Amy took a bite of her muffin as she watched Teddy work on the paper.

Soon enough, a small and frail paper swan took shape.

“Here.” He dropped it in front of her.

“It’s a bit fragile, isn’t it?” She picked it up from the table. “I’m afraid I’ll rip it just by staring at it.”

“Origamis are surprisingly strong.” He said. “But I wouldn’t push it on this one. It’s a _really_ thin paper.”

“I know, right? Couldn’t they make this thicker? I always have to take two if I want to clean my mouth.”

They talked for a while, complaining about the faculty and some of its personnel, until Amy yawned and looked at her phone.

“Oh wow, it’s that late?” She started gathering her things.

“I guess time does fly when you’re having fun.” He got up as well.

They walked to the elevators, chatting vividly. Amy thought it was nice to finally be able to talk to someone who was in the same career as her. It’s not like Jake wasn’t a bad listener but he… really didn’t get the perspective. He wasn’t a teacher, after all.

Teddy and Amy split in the garage, and Amy drove home alone, feeling a bit better.

* * *

On the third and fourth days, Amy was jittery.

Jake had never been on such a long stakeout before, and she was starting to get nervous. Often, she’d just hover her thumb over his photo to text him if he was okay… but she was scared to distract him. And this, in turn, made her feel distracted.

She only had two more days of classes left. This meant that there was really no attention payed to her classes. Amy thought about showing a movie, since her curriculum was basically more than complete at this point, but that would just be a cop out.

“A good teacher should keep the students engaged, no matter what the subject, right?” She said to Teddy, at the college cafeteria. It was almost their usual spot, at that point.

“If you don’t have an expertise in an area, should you even try and talk about it? You’d make a fool of yourself.” He picked a fry from his plate and ate it.

“I don’t mean it like that, idiot.” She grimaced. “I meant it like… Well, if you know more about a subject you should probably talk about it in-depth in a more superficial class and see if anyone reacts to it, right?”

“Not necessarily.” He stretched his arms. “But why are we talking about this, again? You’re an amazing teacher, Amy. I’m sure your students love you.”

She sighed. “Thanks.” She took a fry from his food.

“Hey!” He frowned.

“Sorry, they were just there. I can’t say no to them when they’re calling to me like that.” She showed him a joking smile.

He rolled his eyes. “Okay, I guess.”

Amy changed the subject. “Okay, but about Molder again…”

* * *

The remaining days of the week were a lot more bearable, especially with Teddy’s company. She still worried about Jake (a lot), but Teddy was nice and friendly. He was comfortable. Not exactly… as home-y as Jake, but suitable enough.

She really hoped he wasn’t flirting with her.

“He’s flirting with you.” Kylie said, when they sat down at a coffeeshop, in the weekly meet-up.

“God damn it.” Amy punched the table softly, as to not make too much noise. “I really wish this wasn’t the case.”

Kylie slurped on her smoothie. “Have you told him that you’re, you know, dating someone? For _two_ months now?”

“I… no?”

Kylie crossed her arms. “Have you at least talked about his existence?”

“I’ve mentioned Jake once or twice, but we usually just talk about work.” Amy took a bite off her waffle.

Kylie sighed. “Okay, whatever. Let’s just focus on quiz night!”

Amy felt slightly disturbed by her friends’ comment but chose to not pursue that line of questioning. She clearly didn’t want to talk about it and, to be frank, Amy wasn’t exactly in the mood for it either.

“Okay, so I was thinking, we tackle Monet…” Amy started.

Kylie rubbed her temples and interrupted her. “I’m so tired of him.”

-

Amy got home, exhausted, a little drunk and finally free from work. Well, for a few days, at least. She still had to make a full report of the whole year to the teacher’s board, and face down their wrath.

Groaning, she stared at her phone again. She didn’t know if it was the drinks or the fact that she was just tired, but she finally managed to send a text to Jake.

_I miss you._

That was all it said, and she thought it was enough. He hadn’t been online in so long she started to think that it was all in her head.

Just then, a knock was heard on her door. She got up, wondering who it was.

“Surprise!” Jake said, when she opened the door.

Amy hugged him fiercely and pushed him inside.

“I was so worried! I can’t decide if I want to punch or kiss you!” She exclaimed.

“A kiss would be nice.” Jake smiled. Amy then noticed the bags under his eyes, the tired look his face had, and immediately went soft.

“Hey, is everything all right?” She grabbed his hands and dragged him to the couch.

He plopped down so hard that Amy thought she heard a spring break. She positioned himself on the other edge of the couch, inviting him to lay his head on her lap. He did so, sighing when she started playing with his hair.

“I’m just… really tired.” He said, after a moment.

“Why didn’t you go straight to sleep?” She asked, softly.

“I wanted to see you.” He replied, plainly.

They spent some time like that, Amy touching his hair softly, and Jake just trying his best to stay awake.

“Want to watch TV?” Amy asked.

Jake replied a quiet “no”, so she propped herself up.

“Wait… I was enjoying that.” Jake complained.

“Come on, let’s get you to bed.”

Amy got Jake on his feet and nearly dragged him to bed.

“Lie down.” She ordered.

He obeyed, taking off his shoes before getting on top of the sheets.

“I’m just going to the bathroom, be right back. Okay?”

He nodded, and Amy headed to the bathroom. She caught her reflection and stared at it for a second, seeing her vision blur for a second. She slapped her cheeks to wake a little bit, took off her contacts and washed her face. Then, she changed into her pyjamas.

“Jake?” She asked, when she stepped into her room.

He didn’t reply, and Amy saw how he was breathing steadily. Chuckling, she used her sheets to cover him, and then laid down next to him.

“Good night.” She mumbled and hugged him.

They were both asleep shortly after. As they shifted through the night, Amy’s head ended up on his shoulder and Jake’s chin was on top of it.

* * *

“How was the stakeout?” Amy asked over lunch.

They had stayed in bed until late, simply enjoying each other’s presence.

“It was…” He struggled to find the right words. Despite everything Amy could tell that Jake was still tired. “It was tiring, that’s for sure. We had to basically stay awake twenty-four seven, or risk losing sight of the perps.”

“Jesus, Jake, that sounds awful.”

He chewed on his pasta (they had decided that Italian was what they needed). “It wasn’t that bad. Until we started arguing over every little thing.”

“Yeah.” Amy frowned. “That happens when you spend a lot of time with people.”

“It doesn’t happen when I’m with you.” He said.

Amy almost blushed. Almost. “Yeah, but what else did you guys do?”

Jake hesitated. “It’s kind of hard to describe, and you’re not a cop so…”

“Oh, yeah.” Amy nodded. “Of course.”

A bout of awkward silence filled the space between them.

“Should we just… not talk about our careers?” Jake asked. “This is a bit awkward.”

“But I love to complain about things with you!” Amy swirled her fork.

“So do I, Ames.” Jake smiled.

“Oh, I know! Let’s make a comprehensive set of rules.”

“How am I attracted to you?” Amy stared blankly at him. “Never mind. Shoot.”

“Okay so, rule one: we can complain but we can’t go into too much specifics.” Amy started jotting things down in her phone.

“All right.”

“Rule two: we should probably avoid seeing each other at work.”

Jake stared at her, but she was too focused on typing that she didn’t notice. “That’s a bit weird, but I understand.”

“Rule three, should rule two be broken: No PDA at the workplace.”

“Oh that’s just asking for too much!” Jake said.

Amy grinned at him, and Jake stopped while he was ahead.

“You’re thrifty. Very thrifty.”

“It’s a talent, sweetheart.”

The conversation flowed easily after that, talking about what the other had missed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh no i intoduced teddy what's gonna happen now


	7. Entropy

**Entropy - The amount of unavailable energy in a closed space.**

Jake puffed, his right leg going up and down nervously, and looked at his watch for the thousandth time that day. This got on Rosa’s nerves, since she had to deal with his downright annoying attitude since morning.

“Peralta, you’re going to drive the entire precinct insane with your knees.” The words almost sounded like knives. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on or are you just going to stop?”

Jake stopped bouncing immediately.

“Good.” Rosa said, and turned around.

Jake often wondered if being this close to her during work was a good thing or a bad thing. Well, he didn’t really have time to think about it right now.

He was probably going to do something really stupid. But it was going to be worth it… Something almost on the level of John McClane.

See, Jake was working for the force for nearly a year and a half now, and he was pretty sure he had caught wind of a big drug operation. Like, capital b ‘Big’. Since he was a uniformed officer, there wasn’t much he could do without people catching wind of his investigations, so, he took it a step further: he started taking his work home.

Amy, fortunately, wasn’t aware of this, since what he was doing was _extremely_ illegal, and would get him either sent to jail or at least under extreme scrutiny from Internal Affairs. Which no one appreciated.

He had luck, working for such a short time and already having some pretty trustworthy informants at his will (granted, most of them talked out of fear from Rosa, but that was beside the point). Jake dove into his (lousy written, chaotically spread) notes on the case, and soon had a web of connection spread across his wall.

He smiled when he walked into his apartment one day, seeing the wall filled with wires that stretched from one opposite end of the living room to the other, and he almost felt like a detective. Jake knew he still had a few years to go before he could go up in the ladder, but this might give him the best head start he could’ve asked. Maybe he’d be what he’d always wanted to be sooner than he thought.

Amy never came to his apartment anymore. Jake always found a way to give an excuse to meet at her apartment, and she was only suspicious for about half a minute, before concluding that he was probably just trying to not let her see the mess that was his house.

The amount of time he slept was probably unhealthy, but he didn’t care. He had to catch the ‘big bad guy’, and the only way to do that was to give every single moment of his free time to the case he made in his head. When things got overwhelming, he’d knock on Amy’s door and they’d spend the entire day just unwinding, since she was usually stressed about something as well. Sometimes he’d glance at their shared wall, however, and the wires soon tangled in his brain again. He barely slept those nights, even when hearing Amy breathe next to him.

He was brought back to his moment when the pencil in his mouth was crushed from the clenching of his jaw. Spitting, he took it out of his mouth, and threw half of it in the trash. The other half was probably still useful, even if tiny.

“Peralta!” The Sergeant yelled, after noticing his disgusting behaviour. “Are you going to focus or do you need to go home early?”

Looking around, he could see that everyone on the floor was staring at him.

“Yeah, sorry Sergeant.” He looked as apologetic as he could. “I think I might head home early today. I barely slept and… well. You can see my state.”

He stared at him, until he found it to be a reasonable excuse. “Pack your things, and get out of here.”

“Will do, sir.”

Jake packed his things and picked up his messenger bag, that he slung around his shoulder. After stepping in the elevator, he stared at the several buttons it held. He should go to the ground floor, but the case he was working on just felt too important. Catching himself, he pressed the right button, and descended.

* * *

After stepping into his apartment (making sure to lock the door behind him), he glanced at the chaos on the dull grey wall. He frowned, not because of the amount of information that he had, (though it was a lot) but because he never noted that his walls were that colour. How had he never noticed that?

Shaking his head from what appeared to be trivial thoughts, he sped to his bedroom to remove his uniform as fast as possible. He really wasn’t in the mood to iron it, but it was a requisite that it always had to be in tip-top shape, otherwise he might get another shouting match with the Sergeant. Sighing, he picked his phone and called Amy.

She picked up after three rings. “What’s up?”

“Do you have your ironing board up and running?”

He heard a deep groan on the other end of the line, and couldn’t stop his grin. “You’re impossible. How do you _not_ have an ironing board?”

“Remember when I iron my uniform?” He heard a ‘hm’ that confirmed his question. “Yeah, I’ve only done that at your place.”

Silence from the phone. “All right, fine. But you’re going to buy one as soon as possible. I’m not going to deal with this anymore.”

“Did you really not notice I was ironing my uniform at your place every day?” He threw himself on his bed, the spring complaining loudly.

“First of all, no I didn’t. I’m a busy person.”

“I’m a busy person, too.” Jake interrupted.

Amy ignored him. “Second of all, you need to get a new mattress.”

He rolled his eyes. “Okay, ma’am.”

“I’m saving this discussion for later.” He heard the sound of jangling keys. “Anyway, I’m home, so.”

“Wait, did you go by bus again?”

But she had already hung up.

* * *

Jake was already waiting for her, uniform in hand, by the door when the elevator arrived at their floor. When she saw him, Amy smiled and rolled her eyes at the same time.

Jake never thought anyone could look so adorable.

“You’re lucky I’m in a _great_ mood.” She said, while she was unlocking the door.

“Is it because I’m here?” He pressed a kiss on her cheek.

Amy sighed. “If I didn’t have any self-control, I’d probably go blind from rolling my eyes at you, Jake.”

“Aren’t you blind already?” Jake quipped.

They chuckled and she opened the door. The room was surprisingly warm for the season, and Jake often wondered if she had a hidden thermostat somewhere. He didn’t think he had one at his place (it’s not like he had looked, anyway).

She sat on the couch, rubbing her neck.

“Want a massage?” Jake asked, setting his uniform on the table that was against their shared wall.

She shook her head. “No, I’m fine. I just took a lot of notes today in a really awkward position.”

“Oh, today was that big teacher conference, right?” He sat down next to her. “Where’s the binder?”

She hit the back of his head, playfully. “I didn’t bring the binder with me, dumbass. I always do them _after_.”

“Sorry to insult you, _madame.”_ Jake tried his best to do a french accent.

“You’re not convincing.”

She was smiling, however, and that was all he needed.

Amy turned on the TV and glanced behind her. Elbowing him, she reminded Jake that he had some ironing to do. Already knowing where it was located, (in the laundry room, next to the kitchen) he took the board and the iron out, connecting it to a nearby extension.

Amy talked about her day first, over the sound of the television. She talked about how people from all over the country talked about several topics in her major, including but not limited to: the recovery of Greek antiques, old paintings recovered in basements, some of the science behind digitalizing works of art and something related to the Romans (Jake’s mind slipped for a second and he couldn’t really tell what it was about anymore).

“My life calendar is basically _right_ on track!” She added, at the end.

“Yeah, we’re in our twenties. A lot can go wrong still.” He said.

She looked at him, her eyes shooting daggers. He laughed and put his hands up in the air. “It was a joke! I’m sure you’re going to get wherever you want to go, babe.”

He had finished ironing his suit a long time ago, opting to stand and put his weight on the board, with his legs crossed. His arm was starting to go numb, but he didn’t mind.

“Okay, I felt like I didn’t even let you talk.” She sighed.

“Hey, that’s why you have friends at college, right? They get what you’re going through far more than I ever could.” Moving from his place, he sat down next to her, draping her arm around her. She responded by resting her head on his shoulder.

“You don’t give yourself enough credit.” Amy said.

“Oh, I _know_ I’m amazing.” He said.

She rolled her eyes. “This is the last time I’m giving you any compliments.”

“So yelling my name in bed is out of the question?” He teased. “Last night you were just feeling _really_ nice, huh?”

She punched his shoulder. “I seriously hate you.”

They laughed and watched TV, before falling asleep together.

* * *

The wires on his wall started to follow him everywhere.

He saw the red threads when he was out on patrol. He saw the blue threads when chasing perps. He saw the yellow threads when he saw a bit of the interrogation on the part of the detectives. Pieces were fitting together, but they were also sliding away. It made him want to topple the table and hope that the puzzle landed in the perfect position to form the image he was so desperately clinging to. Jake hoped that the beads of sweat that appeared on his forehead that he got while walking around the streets were just from effort, and not from having this in his head all the time.

He needed someone, a pair of scissors to cut the threads that threatened to suffocate him, and Amy was just that. Sometimes, however, even she couldn’t cut through the thick of his thoughts, and he found himself tangled in the web he made. Amy noticed these moments but said nothing about it. She couldn’t possibly understand his work.

Couldn’t she?

* * *

When Jake saw Amy inside the precinct, his first reaction was confusion, as she was breaking one of their established rules. He furrowed his brows, wondering what the hell she was doing there.

His second reaction was panic. Had she found out about her wall? Was she going there to give him some sort of ultimatum, where if he didn’t show his proof to the detectives, she’d give them himself?

It took him a while to decide that Amy would never do that. So, his third reaction was worry. Had she been robbed? Had something worse happened?

The hurricane of thoughts that were going through his mind only got harsher when she approached Rosa.

If he could yell an interrogation point, he would.

He was about to walk over there, when his Sergeant interrupted him.

“Peralta, have you filed the evidence away properly?” He asked.

“Uh…” He looked over the man, to see Rosa and Amy were backing away. “I have, sir.”

“Really? Because you seem more distracted by your colleagues then actually working.” He added.

Jake looked at his superior. “I can guarantee that the evidence has been processed correctly, sir.” He looked behind him again. They were nearly out of sight, he was going to lose them-

“Like you did last time, officer?”

This got his full attention.

“Excuse me, sir?” Jake tried to hide his anger but didn’t think he was doing a really good job at it.

“Last time you were a mess at labelling things. I got several complaints from the detectives upstairs…”

_The detectives upstairs._

“So, I’m just wondering if you’re taking your job seriously.” The Sergeant finished.

“With all due respect, I take my job _very_ seriously. I arrest bad guys, I file the paperwork. Sir.” He seemed a bit taken aback by Jake’s response, and he almost felt proud of it. “Now if you’ll excuse me.”

Jake moved past his superior, and walked to the last place he saw them talking. No sign of them anywhere. Well, if anyone knew how to hide from people, it was definitely Rosa. He hoped she wouldn’t scare Amy off.

When Rosa got back, however, his girlfriend was nowhere to be found. Trying to strike up a casual conversation, he swivelled in his chair to say something, only to receive a blunt “No.” from her. He’d try another time.

After a few hours of verifying the evidence labels out of spite from his Sergeant’s comments, he returned to find a small sheet of paper on his desk. It was an official behaviour complaint from the man itself.

The only reason that he didn’t set it on fire in front of him was because his squad reasoned with him to not do it.

“Come on, let’s go to Shaw’s! Ignore it, I’m sure it’ll pass.” One of his colleagues said.

What they didn’t know is that it made him rise up in the chain harder. With something like this on his permanent record, making him feel trustworthy enough by the board to get a promotion was challenging. And the Sergeant _knew_ he wanted to become a detective one day.

“He’s doing it out of spite, Jake.” Rosa said, once they arrived at the bar, a bottle already in her hand. “You know how much of a piece of shit he is.”

“Yeah, I know that. I bet he uses the ‘rule’ that ‘the customer is always right’ in stores.” Jake used air quotes to emphasise his point and tried to down the whole bottle of beer in one go.

Rosa laughed, a rare sight. This made him raise his eyebrows, curious as to why she seemed so… nice.

The threads rose up in his mind again. A blue thread connected them, a true bond between them. He couldn’t help but see hints of yellow here and there though, suspicion rising up.

“What did Amy want to talk about?” He asked, suddenly.

“The alcohol really toughens you up, huh?” She hit his shoulder, hard, and he started regretting ever befriending her. While Jake rubbed the place where she hit him, she shrugged. “She’s worried about you, I guess. Asked me to keep an eye on you.”

“And that’s going to Shaw’s?” He took another swig of the liquid (he couldn’t really finish it all the first time).

“I’m never going to lose sight of you here.”

His expression changed from hesitation to agreement, and they clinked their bottles together.

* * *

Jake stayed at Shaw’s for another hour, so the alcohol made his way out of the system. He played some darts with Rosa, pool with some of his co-workers and sang along to a random pop song that started on the speakers.

After that, he said goodbye to his squad and got to his car. The drive home was quiet, only the engine of the car as his only company, since he didn’t want to turn the radio on. When he got out of the car, he found himself seething from the cold outside, which somehow he hadn’t noticed when he left the bar. Considering he had his uniform on and no jacket, Jake ran to the entrance of the building, struggling with to fit the key in the lock of the door. As soon as the door closed behind him, he sighed of relief. The atrium lights flickered on with his presence, and the shift in temperature made him feel better.

When he called the elevator, he was surprised to see Amy on it. Less surprised when he saw the garbage bags in her hand.

“Again?” He asked, standing next to her.

“I do this every week, idiot.” She said and offered him a couple of bags. He took them, after pressing the button for the basement.

“I didn’t mean that, and I think you know it.” Jake said, a bit bluntly.

Amy turned to look at him, brows furrowed. “Is everything all right?”

“I- Yeah.” Jake sighed, caught off guard. “Hard day.”

A ding and some trash thrown in chutes later, they found themselves in the elevator again.

“Almost feels like a throwback, huh?” He noted.

“This elevator does take its sweet time.” Amy replied, and grabbed his arm. He let his head fall on top of hers.

“It is _so_ slow. How can something be so god damn slow?”

“It’s probably for the dramatic irony.” Amy traced circles where she had grabbed him.

“I don’t know what that is.”

She chuckled. “It’s when the audience knows something the characters don’t know about.”

“That’s… actually a pretty simple description. I think I get it.”

“It’s a simple concept to grasp.” She yawned. He yawned a few seconds later.

The elevator doors finally opened, and they walked out slowly, now hand in hand. Amy opened the door to her house, and they both got inside.

“Ugh, wait.” Jake said, before she closed the door. “Let me just take my uniform off.”

“Won’t you have to iron it?” Amy asked.

“Tomorrow’s my day off.” He replied. “I think I can leave it until the last second possible.”

She laughed, and he made his way out. Jake unlocked the door to his apartment and stepped in, closing it with the heel of his shoe. Blue, red and yellow welcomed him again, and he averted his gaze from the wall for the first time since he had started working on the case.

Quickly getting undressed and putting on something far more comfortable, Jake made his way back to Amy’s living room again. She had already connected her laptop to the TV, and was now trying to pick a movie from Netflix.

“Netflix and chill?” He asked, closing her door.

“Ha ha. Hilarious, Jake.” She said, not looking away from the screen. “Wait, are you serious?”

“Not really. I’m too tired.” He sank on her couch.

“Then let me just put something light here…” She typed something on the search bar.

“Is _Die Hard_ in there?”

Amy tried to search for it, but it wasn’t there. “There’s _Indiana Jones_ , though.”

“ _Raiders_ it is, then.”

“Come on, _The Last Crusade_ is better and you know it.” Nonetheless, she still moved the cursor to the movie he asked.

She settled in next to him, the intro blasting.

* * *

“Hey.” He said, after the movie was nearly over. “Can I ask you something?”

The room was dark, the only light coming from the television.

“Always.”

“What were you doing at my precinct today?”

She didn’t talk for a while, probably searching for the right words.

“You saw me?”

“You didn’t exactly blend in.”

He felt her laugh.

“Well…” She hesitated. “I’m worried about you. It seems like you’re in this bubble and you haven’t popped out of it in a few days. I know that… that I broke a rule but I just… I cared.”

The wires inside Jake’s head stopped choking him for just one second. And in that brief second of absolute lucidity, he thought of something. Something that probably wasn’t a good idea, but something nonetheless.

He squeezed her hand and got up. “I’ve got to show you something.”

Amy had a curious look in her eyes, but didn’t say anything as he guided her towards his house.

“Before we go in… I just wanted to let you know I’m not crazy.” Jake said, his back turned to the door.

“This makes it sound like you killed someone.” Amy let go of his hand and crossed her arms.

“Ames, please.” He held a hand next to his heart, as if she had offended her. “I’m a cop, I know how to dispose of a body.”

She rolled her eyes and opened the door for him.

At first, she didn’t see a thing. It was dark, and the streetlamps outside didn’t do much to illuminate the scene. It wasn’t until Jake turned on the light that she saw the wall. Red wires connecting places, blue and yellow wires connecting people. Brushing her fingers through it, she saw how it all seemed to connect, except for some misconnected parts or just some literal loose threads.

“What… What is this?” She stepped back, taking the whole thing in view.

“I’ve been working on this for the last couple of months…” He scratched his neck. “That’s why you haven’t ever gone to my place.”

“Jake… this is…”

“Insane? Deranged?” He touched one of the yellow wires, tracing it until a pin. “Trust me, I know.”

“It’s so thorough.” Amy finally said.

“What?” Jake looked back at her, surprised.

“This is so… thorough. Have you tried showing this to a superior?” She looked at the description under a picture of what she assumed was a perp.

“I uh… thought about it. But this wall of insanity didn’t seem like a good idea to show, you know.” He looked at her skimming through some other picture.

“Have you tried organizing your things? Like, in a binder.”

“I guess I haven’t.” Jake suddenly thought that was a great idea and put one hand over his face. “I don’t know why.”

Amy looked at him, looked at how he rubbed his eyes ferociously and the spark in them.

“You know…” She approached him, leaving the loose blue thread that was on her finger fall to its normal position. “You can tell me anything, right?”

“I…” Jake gulped. “Sorry it’s just… Talking is kind of hard for me. And I don’t want to bother you with my boring cop stuff.”

“Jake, I have never thought your ‘cop stuff’ was boring.”

“Really? Because some of your Art thing is unbearable.” He joked.

“Jake.” Amy looked serious.

“Yeah, yeah, I know.” He let out a sigh. “I know I can tell you anything.”

“Good.” She gave him a small kiss, a reassurance. “Then let’s sleep.”

“That sounds like a great idea.” He murmured in her ear.

“Tomorrow, I’ll help you put this in a binder.”

“A big, fat binder?” Jake kept talking in her ear. He swore he felt her shudder.

“Shut up, Peralta.” And she kissed him again, this time with more passion.

It didn’t take long before things escalated, and in the dark room of his room, Jake swore he could love someone like he loved her.

* * *

The following morning, Jake got up only to not find Amy next to him. There was a text on his phone saying there was a ‘work emergency’ and she’d be back by noon to have lunch with him and start organizing his ‘wall of crazy’ properly.

‘Wall of crazy’ felt like an apt title.

Looking at his clock, he saw that it was 11 AM. He didn’t have much time before she arrived, since Amy was so crazy punctual. Naturally, he thought that eating some toast and watching some TV was the best option.

When she knocked on his door, he still hadn’t moved from his place in the couch, and he thought that maybe he should’ve started organizing some stuff.

“Okay so I was thinking… Don’t take anything from the walls yet and start with a general sense of the picture first.” Amy said, walking into the apartment.

“Don’t you want to eat something first?” He asked.

“I already ate a protein bar on the way, I’m good.” She replied and looked around. “Wait, you haven’t done anything?”

“I just woke up?” He said, as a half-hearted excuse.

She rolled her eyes. “Fine, I guess we can eat first.”

They ordered some pizza, and Amy made him eat it as fast possible so they could get to work (she really like putting things in binders, Jake realised, even though he’d seen first-hand her comparing new binders).

The process itself was long and tiring. They started, as Amy had said, with the general outline. Jake fed her the necessary information, and she made sure to put everything in the most formal way in her documents. Though from completely different careers, Jake guessed that the formal languages of their jobs shouldn’t be much different. And even if it was, Amy’s was probably far more detailed than his.

After finishing the general outline, they started with streets, then perps, then the connections between perps. Drop points, delivery spots and other things obtained from his CI’s were all introduced in this huge document, that soon reached one hundred pages. Amy’s neck and back complained, Jake’s legs and throat protested but, by midnight, a full comprehensive binder filled with the best information was printed and done, revised so beyond the necessary that he was sure that Amy could basically become a cop now.

“I almost feel sad this is over.” Jake said, drinking a glass of water.

“Yeah.” Amy hugged the binder. “Finishing a thing is always so bittersweet.”

He coughed and sat on the counter. “I guess it is.”

They stood there in silence for a while, Jake staring at the binder Amy had brought from her house, a NYPD logo stamped in the back of it.

“You know I have to give the binder tomorrow, right?” He toyed with the air, unsure if it was sad or just tense.

She nodded, removing the binder from her grasp. “Here. It’s all yours.”

Jake took it and opened it, glancing at the pages.

“Cleaning the wall is going to be a bitch, isn’t it?”

Amy laughed.

* * *

“Have you read all of it?” Jake asked, again.

“I’m almost done.” Rosa replied, with a slight tone of annoyance.

He let his chair roll up to his desk again and waited five more minutes. He glanced back and saw that she really was on the last few pages. Deciding not to bother her, he swivelled around again, trying to focus on his monitor again.

Only three more minutes passed when a loud bang erupted from his desk.

“Jesus Christ!” He yelled, looking at the binder next to him.

“It’s good. Some loose threads, but that’s explained and can be seen with resources.” Rosa ignored his yell and went back to her desk.

That was all the confirmation he needed. Picking the document up, he ran to the elevator. As it arrived on his floor, he swayed on his feet nervously. He was going up to the detectives’ floor.

This was fine! Everything was fine.

The grey box dinged its arrival, and Jake pressed the button to go up before he could stop himself. It hummed as it went up. His leg started bouncing nervously. The doors opened once again, and he found himself staring at the bullpen. The bullpen he wanted to work in so badly.

Opening the small fence that led up to the desks, he approached the first person that he saw.

“Uh, Detective Ward?”

The man looked up from his screen “Yes, officer?”

Jake went into a long and incredibly rambled explanation on how he found a drug transportation system and their bosses.

“Do you have any proof of this?” Ward asked, patiently.

He put the binder down next to him. “Yes, it’s all in there. All verified by trustworthy… uh… CI’s.”

“I’ll check it out, Peralta.” He let it stand among the other files.

A twinge of disappointment rushed through him. He hoped his face didn’t show any of it. “Thank you.”

He then left the bullpen.

* * *

“Complete and absolute indifference.” Jake told Rosa, after he got down to his floor. “Didn’t even pretend to read it.”

“Detectives have a lot on their plate.” Rosa said, plainly. “I’m sure he’ll get to it. And it’s a pretty detailed binder, I’m sure they’ll give you _some_ credit.”

“You really think?” Hope flared through his system.

“I’d say I know, but-”

“Peralta, Diaz!” The Sergeant interrupted. “Are you going to chat all day or are you going to work?”

They both rolled their eyes.

“Sorry, sir.” Jake and Rosa said, in unison.

* * *

Jake restated the story to Amy again, that night, and she reinforced Rosa’s feelings.

“We worked really hard on that. I’m sure they’ll give you some credit.” Amy squeezed his hand.

He smiled at her simple gesture. “Thank you.”

They stood like that for a while, arms across his dinner table.

“How was your day?” Jake eventually said, breaking the silence.

“Oh, you wouldn’t believe what Kowaski did this time…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> finally did a decently long chapter!  
> as usual, any comments are appreciated!


	8. Cooling

**Cooling - The process of falling temperature within a closed space, for a defined or undefined period of time.**

Amy gasped as her coffee cup on top of the table fell to the ground.

“Shit.” She said, quietly, hoping no one would hear her.

Someone did, though. “A teacher, swearing?”

She rolled her eyes. “Yes, Teddy. I’m human, I use bad words sometimes.”

Picking up several napkins from the dispenser, she started to clean.

“Why won’t you leave that to janitors?” He asked.

“Because I’m a nice person?” She replied, focusing on scrubbing the floor.

“That’s literally their job, though.” He was now sitting on a chair, watching Amy work vigorously.

Her only response was a deep sigh. She really wasn’t in the mood to deal with Teddy’s mannerisms.

And the day had started off so well.

She had woken up next to Jake again, and they had a good lazy early morning. At this point, Jake’s apartment was more of a commodity than anything: he barely slept in it the last months, only using it when he had a hunch on some police case that he probably hadn’t been assigned to. When she heard his ramblings about his perps, she stopped writing on her notebook and just looked at him, at his extreme re-enactments and how he talked about chasing another person down the street, how the streets were _packed_ and he had almost lost track of them but they’d thought that hiding in a deli was a good idea so Jake arrested him. He always told fun stories, and when she was staring at the computer in her cramped office that she shared with two more people, her mind often wandered to one of his tales.

After leaving him and catching a bus (she didn’t feel like driving that day), Amy found the trip to be surprisingly smooth and quiet. With headphones in her ear muttering some soft piano melodies, she felt like her day couldn’t be ruined.

Her classes went by smoothly enough, the usual affair of one-sided conversations between her and her students. She wasn’t giving an introductory class now, which, after two years giving the basis, she thought was justified. She talked more about assessment and recovery of art pieces, something which she understood better. One person even approached her after class ended, and she liked how they took the initiative.

She waved her head from side, rubbed her eyes and stopped dwelling on the past. Getting up, she cleaned her pants and threw the paper in the trash.

“See? No effort at all.” Amy addressed Teddy, after sitting down in front of him.

“Then why do you seem tired?” He smirked, and she wanted to slap that look off his face.

“It’s been a long day.” She said.

He stopped pressing, and a bit of awkward silence rose up.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to annoy you.”

Amy laughed. “You’re not annoying me, Teddy. Jake annoys me.”

She swore she saw him flinch involuntarily but shook the thought out of her head.

“How’s he doing?” He asked.

“Fine. Not obsessing over a case.” She replied.

The cafeteria suddenly felt like it shrunk, and Amy couldn’t really pinpoint the reason why her friendship with Teddy was growing more and more tense. It’s not like she disliked him: he was nice, and she liked talking to him about the college gossip.

After her last class, she went back to her office only to be assaulted on all fronts with a ton of unanswered emails that came from co-workers, asking about a wide range of topics. Needless to say, she was exhausted from having to run around from office to office, confirming her information before sending responses to her colleagues. Some of it was so trivial she almost lost her mind trying to solve minor issues.

Thankfully, before she could dwell on the disaster that was that afternoon, her phone came to life with a call from her boss. Amy excused herself from the table and slid the green icon.

“Yes?”

“Amy, good to know you’re available.” The man said from the other end. “Are you by the campus? There is something I need to ask of you.”

“I’ll go by your office straight away.” Amy hung up the call.

She turned to say goodbye to Teddy, but he was already gone.

* * *

She composed herself before knocking on the office’s door.

“Come in.” A calm voice said.

She did so, and her boss invited her to sit down.

“I’ll go straight to the point, since chit chat isn’t my strong suit.” He started as soon as she sat. “I have a very big opportunity for you in this envelope here.” He slid a white envelope across the table, and she picked it up.

“What is it?” Amy tried to understand its contents without opening it. She didn’t want to ruin the package of the first letter from her _boss_.

“It’s an internship.”

If Amy didn’t have any self-respect, she’d probably be jumping up and down in glee. Instead, she opted to simply raise her eyebrows. “An internship?”

“A paid internship, to be more specific.” He closed his hands together and let them fall on the wooden table.

“I don’t even know what to say.” Amy said. “I’m incredibly thankful for this opportunity, sir. I just hope I won’t let you down.”

He nodded in her direction. “I’m positive you won’t. You’re one of the best minds in this department, and I think staying here all the time is letting it go to waste.”

She got so caught up in the compliment that she almost let the last part go by her.

“What do you mean… ‘staying here’?”

“Oh, the internship isn’t here. It’s not even in the same continent.” The man smiled. “It’s in Paris.”

Amy almost couldn’t speak. “Pa-Paris?”

“Yes, Amelia. Paris.” He gave her a half smile. “Something like this is perfect for you: Paris is almost a capital of art, and you could probably write ten thousand papers on the Louvre itself.” Amy was about to say something, when he kept going. “Which I’m sure you have done.”

Bewildered beyond belief, Amy managed to stutter “I haven’t done that many papers on it” before regaining her composure.

“Thank you so much, Mr. Cozner.” She said and stretched her hand.

“Please.” He shook her hand. “Call me Kevin.”

* * *

She decided to walk by the river after that. The sun was setting by that point, making the buildings feel like golden monoliths, the water a shimmery surface that felt like you could walk upon. It was beautiful.

Amy almost felt as if she wanted to absorb as much of the city as she could, before going away. The envelope was in her messenger bag, slung lazily across her shoulder. She glanced at the bag sometimes, as if to remind herself that it was there, and that it was all real.

Her mind was brought out from its reverie when her phone started loudly beeping in her pocket. She didn’t even bother looking at the caller ID, simply picking up the call.

“Hello?” She asked.

“Hey!” A warm voice replied. “Are you home?”

She immediately felt warm. “No, Jake. Sorry.”

“You okay?” He sounded concerned. “You sound tired.”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” She put her shoulders on top of the railing that divided the concrete and the sea. “Just walking around.”

“You want any company? I just left the precinct so…”

Amy thought about it for a while. She didn’t want to tell him just yet, let the bubble float around for a bit longer. They’d been together for the better part of a year and a half, but things still felt fresh.

“Sure. Come around.” She sent him her coordinates and waited by him on the pier.

After waiting for what felt like little time, (but was, in fact, nearly half an hour – Jake had gotten lost somehow) she felt his presence next to her.

“Just watching the sunset?” He asked.

She hummed as a response, and Jake took it as a yes. Amy noticed he was still in uniform, but in that lax way of his when he was out of the clock – sleeves rolled up to his elbows, the tie nearly on his ribs and the buttons mostly undone. Amy almost wanted to scold him for it but appreciated that he was relaxed enough to be like that in public, since his Sergeant would probably give him hell for it (he had, in the past).

She sidestepped to move closer to him, averting her gaze to the vast expanse in front of her and wrapping her arm around his. He grabbed onto her loose hand.

She didn’t take her eyes from the horizon. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

Jake squeezed her hand. “I guess so.”

The water splashed below them, the sound of the sea and the wind the only thing breaking the silence. They just stood there, clinging to one another, as the city blew by behind them, unaware of their existence.

It was a moment Amy promised herself to never forget, as she untangled from him and shivered.

“Are you cold?” Jake asked, keeping her close.

She shook her head, and he offered his arm again.

“Don’t be shy.” He asked. “I’d offer you my uniform, but I’m scared to death of the Sergeant.”

Amy rolled her eyes but laughed and took his arm once again. “You’re so stupid.”

“It’s part of the charm.”

The walk home was long, but it wasn’t tedious. At first, they walked in silence, still holding on to each other, the sound of cars speeding (or rather, slowing) and the breeze keeping them company. Then, they talked about their days. Amy neglected to mention the fact that she got offered a paid internship in Paris, but talked about everything else, including the tension she started feeling with Teddy.

“Have you tried telling him about it?” Jake asked innocently, as they turned a corner.

“It’s not as easy as it sounds, coming up to a person and telling them something’s wrong.” Amy said, letting her head fall on his shoulder for a while. “I think you, the master of deflection, would know this.”

“I’m not the master of deflection!” He sounded almost outraged, but there was a hint of mocking in his voice. “I can’t deflect bullets!”

“Yet.”

“Yet?”

“I don’t know, there might be some giant magnet that throws bullets off course or something.” She shrugged. “I’m not a physicist.”

“But you have a surprisingly deep knowledge of physics.” He quipped.

This forced her head off his shoulder. “I’m naturally curious okay? Leave me alone.”

“Ah, there it is. The Santiago pout.” Jake grinned at her, and she rolled her eyes again.

The typical banter followed, this time on his side. Jake talked about his day, how his whole floor was basically searching for this guy some detectives had put an APB on (sometimes Jake forgot what APB meant, and Amy was always there with the answer) and he managed to tackle the guy into a random bench, nearly knocking both unconscious. Amy would be worried, but since he had told about almost getting shot several times, the concern took a backseat.

“Did they give you any credit for that case all those months ago?” Amy asked, when they were in their block.

Jake frowned. “Not really, no. I mean, they called me up again and congratulated me on the job well done, but they never talked to me again.” He sighed. “There was a lot of arrests the week after, and I recognized most perps.”

Amy’s heart squeezed and she caressed his arm. “I’m sorry, Jake.”

“No, it’s okay.” Amy stared at him. “Really, it is! I wasn’t expecting a lot of recognition anyway.”

“But you did most of the work!”

They had reached their building at this point.

“You don’t know what the detectives did.” He took his keys out of the pocket.

“You think they got to your point in a week where it took you months?”

Jake flinched, and Amy went quiet. She didn’t mean to hurt him.

As he unlocked the front door, she apologized. He waved it off, saying that she was right, but there was nothing he could do about it now.

“I should’ve asked you about it sooner, though.” She pressed the matter. “I feel like maybe I’m not doing enough and-”

Jake kissed her to shut her up. “The fact that you’re so worked up about it means you care.” He called the elevator, the other hand still firmly holding on to hers. “That’s all I need.”

Her heart melted.

The rest of the evening was spent eating leftovers and watching a dumb movie that was on. The envelope was left forgotten in her bag, but something that remained in her subconscious.

* * *

Amy only managed to open the envelope two days later, always finding an excuse to ignore it. Now, she was home alone, left with only her thoughts as company. And, as usual, they went straight to the folded white piece of paper that lay waiting in onE of the drawers in the table next to the entrance (she had placed the envelope there because Jake never checked those drawers, he probably found them boring).

Picking up a letter opener, she carefully unglued the front of the envelope, trying to preserve it. Soon, a thin sheet of paper, decorated with the college’s logo appeared. She read it all thoroughly.

_Dear Amy Santiago,  
We are proud to inform you that you have been selected for a prized internship in the city of Paris…_

She scoured through the contents of it quickly, reading it three more times just in case she had missed anything.

It was a one-year program. She was going to teach at a local college (or university, that’s how they called them in Europe) and aid on research with a local teacher there, called Pièrre Aubertin. The whole department he worked at knew how to speak English, so she was safe in the language department (it didn’t stop her from wanting to learn French, however).

Amy absorbed all the details possible, already writing some scattered notes so she could organize her thoughts and put them in a binder later.

Her computer hummed with a playlist of random French songs she had found on Spotify, and she started to investigate housing and other important things. She quickly realised that Paris was quite expensive, but the paid part of her internship was bound to help her.

After exhausting all her options, she stared at the letter once again.

Amy was supposed to leave in a month. She had one month to talk to Jake about this.

Sighing, she went to her bedroom and fell on the bed, longing for the warmth of her sheets.

Jake didn’t sleep at her place that night.

* * *

_"Je ne veux pas travailler…"_

“What song is this?” Jake asked from the couch, three weeks later.

They were at her place, Amy ironing some clothes (including his uniform). She still hadn’t told him about France.

She froze when he made that question. “Oh, just a random song Spotify recommended me.” Moving her iron quickly, she realised she had almost burned her favourite pantsuit.

Silence followed, which Amy took as Jake accepting the answer and not going further.

“You know I want to become a detective, right?” He asked.

Okay, so she was wrong.

“Yeah, of course I do.”

“Then you know lying to me…” He turned around and looked at her. “Is kind of a bad idea, right?”

She rolled her eyes. She wasn’t _technically_ lying – Spotify really had recommended that song to her. “I’m not lying, Jake.”

“Well, you’ve been hiding something.”

She raised her eyebrows. “And your proof is?”

“For one, you’re more jittery than usual. I mean, you’ve always _been_ jittery, but every time I come home, I see you shoving a binder in its place really fast or shutting some tabs on your computer.” He stretched his arms. “Which means you’re either planning something or something’s coming up that you don’t want me to see or know about.” Jake looked at her, expectantly. “Proof enough?”

“It just proves to me you’re a stalker.” Amy said. She was kind of scared at how spot on he was, however. When he got to detective, she was pretty sure he’d be amazing. If a bit sloppy.

“That’s deflection.”

“I taught _you_ that!” She stopped ironing.

Jake grinned. “Doesn’t mean I don’t get to use it against you.” His face turned serious. “What’s going on, though? You can tell me anything.”

He got up and grabbed her hands, dragging her to the couch, despite her complaints that she had to iron all the clothes.

“Come on. Spit it out.” He grabbed her hand. “Whatever it is, I can handle it.”

_Can you handle this, though? I don’t want to hurt you._

“I… uhm. Wow.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe words are hard to come by.”

“Welcome to my life.” Jake said, and smiled.

She didn’t smile back.

_Well, better to just rip the band-aid out, right?_

“I’ve been offered a paid internship.” She blurted out.

Jake beamed, his smile growing even bigger than what she thought possible. “That’s amazing! Oh my God, Ames, I’m so proud of you!”

“In Paris.”

His face fell. “What?”

“I’ve been offered a paid internship… in Paris.” Amy said.

A beat.

“Oh.” He said.

“Yeah.” She took in a deep breath. “Uhm, there’s more.”

“More?”

“I leave next week.”

Jake went quiet for a moment.

“Where… Where does that leave…” He motioned to both of them.

“Us?” Amy completed him. “I don’t know. I really don’t know.” She grabbed her head. “This whole thing has been a complete headache. I didn’t want to tell you anything but leaving without even giving you a heads up is just being a complete shithead.” She looked at their intertwined hands. “I think I like you too much to do that.”

He gave her a sad smile. “I don’t want to be stupid here, but have you considered not taking the internship?”

“I… I tried. I talked to Kevin – my boss…”

“You’re on a first name basis now?” He joked.

Despite the dire situation, she smiled. “Jake.”

“Sorry, sorry, move on.”

She gulped. “As I was saying, I tried talking to Kevin, but he was adamant. He said that my skills could only be properly developed over there.”

“On the other side of the Atlantic.” He almost made it sound like a question.

“On the other side of the Atlantic.” She confirmed.

“So, I’m going. I don’t want to leave New York, Jake, I really don’t, but if he says it’s what’s best for me, I _must_ go. Picture it like…” She struggled to find the right analogy.

“…Like me being offered a position of detective in LA. Near Nakatomi Plaza.”

She smiled. It was exactly what she was aiming to say. “Yeah. Like that.”

Silence enveloped them, and Amy didn’t really know what to say next, so she waited for him to talk. She let her thumb run in circles around his hands, in a vain attempt to soothe him.

“This means we have to break up.” He finally said.

She still flinched at what he said. “I… I think so. We could try long distance, but it’s for such a long time - one year - that I’m scared you’ll end up frustrated with everything or I get really annoyed and we stop talking in bad terms.” She sighed. “And I want to keep talking to you, you know? Before we started dating, we were still friends.”

He smiled sadly. Amy almost broke down crying at the sight of him, but remained strong.

“So…” He looked at her. “Friends.”

“Friends.” She said.

It almost sounded hollow.

“This is probably asking for too much but…” Her voice broke, and she could feel her composure starting to crumble. “Can we at least be together for one more night?”

He pulled her into a tight hug. “Of course, Ames. Anything you want.”

She hugged him back, hoping that the tears that were now falling wouldn’t stain his shirt too much (she nearly laughed at that: she was breaking up with someone she loved dearly and all she could think about was his dirty clothes).

They were in the hug for a long time, just feeling each other breathe, Amy unaware of Jake’s tears that he desperately didn’t want her to see.

When they finally separated, Amy wiped her face, and remembered something.

“Shit! I didn’t finish ironing!”

Jake laughed, and she saw his reddened face. Choosing to ignore it, she laughed with him.

They talked and talked for the rest of the night, ignoring the looming deadline that approached.

* * *

“I don’t want to go.” Amy was staring at the airport security, glued to the floor.

“Come on, Amy.” Jake never called her Ames anymore. “You have to go.”

“Listen to the man.” Kylie said. “You’re going to waste the opportunity of a lifetime if you don’t go.”

“Are we still going to talk every week?” She asked Kylie.

“Of course we will.” She hugged her friend. “Now go, before I cry.”

She stared at Jake. “Are we…”

He gave her a warm smile, but it didn’t really reach his eyes. “Of course we will, Santiago. Now get out of here.”

Their hug was tight and maybe a bit too long, but she didn’t mind. She sighed and went to the escalator, waving goodbye to the pair as she went further up.

“See you in one year!” They shouted at her.

Amy nearly cried at the sight of them, but she managed to turn her back.

She never looked back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm sorry guys but i had to do it  
> please don't kill me they're still friends
> 
> if anyone wants to know i listened to the Undertale soundtrack A LOT while writing this and one track stood out to me  
> it's called Respite (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-fyLcHg4iM) and it's wonderful
> 
> don't forget to tell me what you thought! comments and kudos are appreciated!!
> 
> also this will probably be the last update until mid-august. i'm going to a place with barely any wifi and scarce network so... yeah


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